PWP: Flank the Flank

WSNPP: PWP – Edition #6: Flank the flank

SO what this guide is about is literally flank the flank. This is a neat counter strategy to flanks that I find personally to work most of the time. It works best in team battles but work just as well in one on one’s.

Flanking is common in Wesnoth. In fact it’s almost a principle that all players follow, intentionally or unintentionally to surround, ZoC and kill a unit. So common is the tactic that you’d think people would know how to counter it properly. Well one strategy was to just kill a few units on one side and run away through there.

It works, but at a great cost. The most likely outcome is that you’re half dead or crippled and the opponent’s army is still intact. Other strategies were just killing every unit that you encounter or running away and try to get past the ZoC slowly whilst being hit from all sides. And before I get you into confusion thinking that these strategies are bad, well in fact they aren’t. They work and they’re good but there are even better counters out there. The best counter in my opinion is never get flanked by scouting before hand or just keeping an eye on your flanks by having a unit (preferably scout of some sort) to give you vision.

First of all let’s get things straight to utilise a flank you need at least 2 groups of armies, not one massive big ball of death. In a one on one situation pulling off a flank on another flank is difficult as most likely your whole army will be bunched together. If your armies are separated, you can easily start a flank but the issue here is that your one group of your army is subjected to being taken down in 2 turns or less by the opponent’s main force.

Now that we’ve discussed the requirements to pull off a flank,(E.G) P1’s 1st group has to be on standby in a tactical position to launch an ambush, whilst 2nd group is moving around the target to get behind, staying out of sight. Once the enemy engages with P1’s 1st group, attack with the second group from behind FIRST. The reason why, is that initially 1st group would be weakened from the first attack, attacking with them first will weaken them more and then when it’s the enemies turn he can just kill your 1st group and push onwards to victory. So let your 2nd group attack first, see how things go and then attack or retreat with your 1st group. The whole idea of a flank is to keep the enemy trapped (ZoC) in a certain area and contained, whilst separate their concentrated fire amongst other units or just too simply crush the enemies army. Follow-up tactics like village taking or sending a strike team to kill his leader works well.

TO flank this flank, the opponent (P2) would have to have 2 groups as well, and hopefully his second group won’t encounter a tea party with his opponent’s flank group. Once he’s in position, he’ll take the bait, he’ll fall into the opponent’s trap and attack with his group 1. The enemy (P1) will attack with his 2nd group and flank (P2’s) group 1. Once that occurs, P2 can then send in his own flank team and flank the flanking team. What are the possible outcomes? Well depending on your luck, your unit composition, placement on terrain and your knowledge of resistances; either (P2’s) group 1 will die or (P1’s) flanking group will die. Both players will normally take some damage but it is fairly minimal.

However this tactic may seem to you there are some issues tied to it. For example, you need to know that your enemy is going to attempt a flank and you then need to make decisions on whether you take the bait and flank the flank or not. OR you could be in a situation where you only notice the flank attempt in the last minute and the decision then is either, retreat, flank the flank or just charge. Always about decisions, leading into the next PWP guide.

Next Edition - #7: Making decisions

Previous Edition - #6: The power of 2

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